“What we do really well in this country is trauma care…emergency room care. But what we do poorly is everything else because, I believe, we are the main cause of illness. I think that the medical community, and I know I’m attacked by saying this, I think that, in general, doctors and hospitals cause more harm long-term than they help.”

These were the words of Dr. Toni Bark, MD during her recent interview with HighWire host Del Bigtree. The US medical community and its health insurers have been front and center over the last month as President Trump and the US Congress wrestle with Obamacare’s future. While access to healthcare remains an issue for many, a magnifying glass has been increasingly placed on an uncomfortable fact: is the US healthcare system the best in the world?

Dr. Bark’s arguments appear to be backed up by multiple sources and directions. The immediate, short-term harm caused by America’s medical system has been clearly documented. The public is seeing more smoke within an already blazing fire at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). In their 2016 open letter to the CDC, a group of Johns Hopkins medical students together with Martin Makary M.D., M.P.H., Professor of Surgery and Health Policy & Management at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, have pointed out that the CDC tabulates the national mortality statistics by assigning an International Classification of Disease (ICD) billing code to the cause of death. As a result, causes of death not associated with an ICD code — such as human error and system factors/inadequacies in medical care — are not captured. The letter states:

“The current methodology used [by the CDC] to generate the list has what we believe to be a serious limitation. As a result, the list has neglected to identify the third leading cause of death in the United States — medical error. Moreover, the 251,454 estimate we derived from the literature is an underestimate because the studies conducted did not include outpatient deaths or deaths at home due to a medical error."

The untruthful numbers generated by the CDC have presently and historically been used to push legislation and force treatment upon US citizens by commonly citing the financial burden the major causes of mortality generate on society. Government and the medical industry have built a system of business and legislation around the false premise that US healthcare is an infallible savior. What happens when the main option for healthcare is also the third leading cause of death? How dismal are a patient’s odds if they enter the US healthcare system (3rd leading cause of death) with cancer (2nd leading cause) or heart disease (1st leading cause)?

It was recently reported that developing cancer is now more common than getting married or having a first baby. By now, many are beginning to understand that one of the problems with chemotherapy is that it doesn’t address the underlying cause(s) of cancer. The American medical system, along with its patients, lost Richard Nixon’s 1971 war on cancer long ago, yet it appears few lessons have been learned. Many studies have shown that traditional cancer treatments offered by mainstream medicine are ineffective. The increasing trend of price gouging by pharmaceutical companies over their inferior chemotherapy drugs has become untenable to the point that even career oncologists are up in arms. One may start wondering that perhaps when the advantages of conventional cancer treatments are shown in the medical literature, it might be based on statistical manipulation.

Many patients, who have begun to educate themselves about cancer, are realizing that it is not just some unlucky, random event they have little power over. To the contrary, it is something that can be prevented or healed. More evidence continues to show that the overburden of environmental toxins – from the untested, increasingly dense schedule of vaccines to pesticides, toxic self-care products, and household chemicals we encounter in our day-to-day living — may be playing a major role in the development of various forms of cancer. Many alternative, non-toxic options and cancer-healing modalities are available to those who seek them.

A topic that seems to never stay in the headlines or receive much mainstream media follow-up is the continued targeting of America’s youth and college-age students with mind-altering medications. According to a study published back in 2008 in the Journal of American College of Health, it is estimated that more than 30 percent of college students use illegally obtained ADHD meds. And full-time students are twice as likely to use them than part-time students. One could argue that if college kids are using these drugs illegally, then the medical system is off the hook, right? But who do they obtain these prescription meds from?

According to the 2012 ACHA’s National College Health Assessment, more than 20 percent of college students have been diagnosed or treated for one or more mental health conditions, including ADHD. And it doesn’t just start in college. According to a CDC databrief, “during 2012–2013, an estimated annual average of 6.1 million physician office visits were made by children aged 4–17 years with a primary diagnosis of ADHD” and “central nervous system [CNS] stimulant medications were provided, prescribed, or continued at about 80% of ADHD visits among children aged 4–17 years.”

The pill-dispensing practice of psychiatry, which is increasingly habituating US children and young adults to CNS stimulants, is not rooted in objective testing. The clusters of observations that lead to diagnosis of a ‘disorder’ are nothing more than a menu of behaviors agreed upon by ‘experts’. In fact, one such expert Keith Conners, often called the “Father of ADHD,” was behind the institutional naming of the disorder. Long after Conners first developed the standard rating scales for ADHD and conducted the first trial of the then new drug methylphenidate (Ritalin), he was quoted saying:

“It seems obvious to me that the steady increases over time in the apparent high prevalence of ADHD is due to doctor practices fueled by the shoddy science and allure of the big numbers, without the only meaningful ingredient of a comprehensive clinical history.”

Having watching the growing epidemic of ADHD over-diagnosis, Conners announced to stunned colleagues that they are witnessing “an epidemic of tragic proportions.”

The US healthcare system will be forced to undergo changes as more and more people educate themselves and make better informed decisions about their own health. Perhaps in the future, the epidemic of pharmaceutical drug prescribing and over-vaccination will yield itself to more holistic approaches that address the root causes of the major diseases and disorders of our time.